A trip to Aylesbury!
Spännande läsning om när "The Ambassador" tog emot QPR hemma i Aylesbury!
Well it was not really a trip as QPR in Aylesbury provided me with my shortest journey of the season and I had the pleasure of being able to walk to the match. It also provided an opportunity to meet up with a number of local QPR fans and make our way to the match together.
We met up at the Rockwood pub in Aylesbury town centre and after the introductions and a couple of pints it was on to the New Zealand and then as we made our way closer to the ground it was into the Horse & Jockey for another before making our way into the ground.
Aylesbury have one of the better non-league stadiums and are known for the quality of their pitch, England themselves trained on it (and played the local team) in preparation for one of their games last season. It seemed the grass was a bit long but I imagine they are preparing it for the new season. A ten pounds ticket cost was perhaps a little on the high side but with QPR having half the takings and a good size crowd expected it wasn't really a surprise. I have never been that good at estimating numbers but I'd say there were about 1500 (since beginning this article the local Aylesbury paper have the attendance listed as 1090).
To be honest there isn't a great deal to report from the match itself, it was a fairly typical pre-season game though I did notice the players were tackling hard on both sides. Ainsworth was the most noticeable, a typical winger, who is going to spend a lot of time being brought down as he flys down the wing and so should pick up some useful free kicks as well as putting in the crosses. He also scored the Rs opening goal with a rather scuffed cross shot.
There were some nice passing moves between Gallen and Furlong and Bircham was his usual busy self. The obvious stand out though was Clive Delaney, this is partly due to his size and I can only think Ollie has decided that the best way to stop the opposition players scoring is to scare the hell out of them by having the biggest, meanest defence in the league. He coped well with everything in the air and on the ground and I would imagine on this showing and his apparent good display against Farnborough he will be offered a contract.
Eric Sabin I am not as sure about, he was hard working for little final result but may need more time to settle. He did get the second goal from a Wes Daly (who also looked good) cross though from where I was standing he almost managed not to score from right under the cross bar. Whilst only 2-0 it is fair to say though that neither Day nor Culkin (who played a half each) had a serious save to make during the match.
There were a lot of substitutions with players such as Bircham and Carlisle actually coming back on and Kevin Gallen played the last 15 minutes as left back!! The players were all happy to sign autographs with the young lad in our group managing to secure almost every player in the squad (thanks to Nick Culkin for passing the book around most of them and to Gino for securing the highly prized signature of Tim Breaker), he had to dash on the pitch for Terrell's during the warm down but was very pleased when Terrell told him to be lucky. Much to his mother's dismay he had been claiming to be an Arsenal fan but such was the welcoming nature of the team and the realisation he wouldn't have the same access to players such as Terry Henry and Freddie Ljungberg he was soon singing the praises of QPR. Another youngster has crossed over and seen the light.
We chatted to Richard Pacquette's family, a number of whom come from Aylesbury and his cousin Jefferson Louis, the Oxford forward, was also there watching him play. We proceeded to the bar at the club and had a couple of pints, a few of the players popped in and then disappeared. It was at this point we realised the players bar was next door so we quickly went round the corner and found most of the team in there. We passed Gino on the way in but unfortunately he was on the phone as it would have been great to catch a few words with the Argentinian superstar. Straight up to the bar and Birch was sitting there (drinking mineral water as were the rest of the team) and we asked him how pre-season was going. They don't seem to enjoy the early starts at the RAF camp where they have been spending most of this week and if he said that he would definitely never want to join the forces!!
I turned round to order a beer and when I turned back he had gone, I had had a fair bit to drink by that stage and no doubt he had far better things to do than be slurred at by me!! The chap I was with had managed to find Richard Pacquette as was busy telling him how wonderful he was and how he would be a superstar this season though I think he just about managed to stop short of telling him that he loved him. This scene the repeated itself about 10 minutes later and (unfortunately for Pacman) he also saw him in town afterwards at which point the same conversation took place again!!
Kevin Gallen was busy shaking hands with everyone and I then saw Colin Delaney, the big defender we have on trial and who has been quite impressive so far, and so I went over for a chat. I told him he'd had a good game, asked him how it was going and whether he would be signing for us or not. He said he wanted to sign but as yet he hadn't had a contract offer but he was training hard and hoped that he would be offered a contract with us. On the basis of what I saw and others have commented on from the Farnborough match I would hope we do sign him up.
I cannot really remember who else we saw but Chris Day was about and was leaving at the same time as us. He was very gracious especially given that there were eight of us all trying to wish him good luck for the season and I am not sure what he made of me asking why he had the blue streak in his hair again as it would mean I would have to (attempt) to copy him again this season.
They say you are usually disappointed when you meet your heroes but this was not the case at Aylesbury though quite what those heroes made of us their fans is another question altogether!!
Roll on August the 9th!
